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Amnesty International was launched in 1961 by Peter Benenson, a British lawyer, after reading about two Portuguese students who had been sentenced to seven years\' imprisonment for raising their glasses in a toast to freedom.
His newspaper appeal, \"The Forgotten Prisoners\", was published worldwide on 28th May 1961 and brought in more than 1,000 offers of support for the idea of an international campaign to protect human rights. Human rights are set out as principles in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. A declaration is not legally binding. It lays out principles and objectives and carries moral weight.
Full human dignity means not only freedom from torture, but also freedom from hunger. It means freedom to vote and the right to education. It means freedom of expression and the right to health. It means the right to enjoy all rights without discrimination.
In 1986, the UN General Assembly adopted the Declaration on the Right to Development, which states that:
\"The human person is the central subject of development and should be the participant and beneficiary of the right to development.\"
Some human rights:
o Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association.
o All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination.
o Everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others.
o Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits.
o Everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he is the author.
Real Lives - Worldwide Appeal
The UK Section publishes the bi-monthly magazine, \"Amnesty\", which contains information of six victims of human rights abuse, whose cases could benefit from a mass appeal.
Every year Amnesty holds a number of short-term campaigns (usually 3-6 months) to draw attention to human rights abuses in specific countries.
From the beginning, the principles of strict impartiality and independence were established. Amnesty members were to act on cases worldwide, but not become involved in cases in their own countries and the emphasis was on the international protection of human rights.
Early staff members and volunteers got involved in partisan politics while working on human rights violations in their own countries. Early campaigns failed because Amnesty was misinformed about certain prisoners. This led to the establishment of a formidable research section and the process of \"adoption\" of prisoners of conscience.
While Amnesty International will work to ensure a fair trial for all political prisoners, it does not adopt as prisoners of conscience anyone who has used or advocated violence for any reason. It rarely provides statistical data on human rights abuses, and never compares the human rights records of one country with another.
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